New York Today: The Hudson River Isn’t Dirty. It’s Alive.

It’s a little something we learned from the River Project, a group studying and restoring the Hudson River Estuary.

“A lot of people look at the river and talk about it looking dirty, and obviously it’s not like pictures of the Caribbean,” said Nina Hitchings, who oversees the project’s wetlab on Pier 40.

But, she said, that murkiness is a good thing.

“There is a lot of algae and phytoplankton and zooplankton in the water column, making this a super productive ecosystem and making this a nursery for fish,” Ms. Hitchings told us. “Hundreds of years ago, before many people came, it would’ve been the same color.”

(June, in particular, is prime time for spawning in our aquatic backyard: The water is hot and salty, so oceanic fish and marine species use our gentler, shallower estuary as a nursery until the young fish mature enough to head out to sea.)

The River Project has been running a fish ecology survey for 30 years to track trends in the lower section of the Hudson River, and since 1988 it has discovered nearly 60 species.

We recently stopped by the wetlab, the group’s marine research field station, to meet some of the creatures living beneath our bridges and ferries.

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See the seahorse?CreditRuth Fremson/The New York Times

Most unexpected: The (adorable!) lined seahorse, a growing population here that migrates hundreds of miles from the continental shelf to use our estuary as a nursery and mating ground in the summer.

Most peculiar: The hogchoker, a flatfish born with eyes on opposite sides of its flat, speckled body — but as it becomes an adult, one eye travels next to the other, on the flip side.

Most powerful: The striped bass, the predator at the top of the Hudson River food chain.

Most deceiving: The three-spined stickleback, a tiny but incredibly ferocious fish with three very sharp spines beneath its dorsal fin that can be used, like knives, as a weapon against predators.

And our personal favorite: The blue mussels, which are undergoing EKG screenings at the wetlab — the shellfish are hooked up to wires and sensors in a tank, as you’d see in a hospital, so researchers can gauge how the water quality affects their heartbeats.

You can become acquainted with these New Yorkers and others (like turtles, eels and crabs) this afternoon at the River Project’s free “Meet the Fishes” event, from 4 to 7 p.m. in the wetlab off Houston and West Streets.

Here’s what else is happening:

Weather

Sunny to start, until the skies turn from radiance to rain this afternoon.

(We may get a thunderstorm, too.)

High of 74; low of 56.

In the News

• As he seeks a third term, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo is embracing a pro-union stance, nearly a decade after he vowed to take on organized labor. [New York Times]

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Gov. Andrew Cuomo has long had the support of New York State’s biggest union, 1199 S.E.I.U., which represents health care workers.CreditDrew Angerer/Getty Images

• The reputed mobster Thomas Gioeli, known as Tommy Shots, is suing the government, claiming he broke his kneecap in jail when he slipped in a puddle while playing table tennis. [New York Times]

• Grace Gold was killed when concrete fell from the facade of a Columbia University building in 1979. Decades later, the university has been cited for the building’s cracked exterior. [New York Times]

• A judge barred New Jersey from withdrawing its support for the Waterfront Commission, which was created in 1953 to combat the influence of organized crime on the docks. [New York Times]

• A new city proposal would allow adults who don’t identify as male or female to select a gender of “X” on their birth certificates. [Gothamist]

• A five-part series from WNYC details New York’s connection to Puerto Rico’s financial crisis, how it came to be and what’s necessary to solve it. [WNYC]

• The city announced a multipronged plan to save factories and jobs in the garment district. [AM New York]

• The longtime Fort Greene clothing store Moshood is hoping its neighbors will pitch in and help the store owners pay their ever-increasing rent. [Patch]

And Finally...

We’re all in the mood for a melody.CreditChristian Hansen for The New York Times

Pianos are popping up along our promenades.

As part of the public art project Sing for Hope, a fleet of brightly painted pianos is being strewn along streets and sidewalks across the five boroughs.

The instrument is part of New York’s DNA: Steinway & Sons was created in 1853 in Manhattan (manufacturing was later shifted to Queens), and beginning in the 1800s, our city was also considered the printing capital for piano sheet music.